Are We Alright?
by SparklingLetters
Summary: Missing scene: takes place sometime between The Miller's Daughter and The Evil Queen. Archie eventually seeks out Regina after he has escaped the Jolly Roger. Their conversation takes a slightly more intimate turn than he expected.


There she was, a lone figure sitting on the wrought-iron bench overlooking the apple tree. After days of contemplation and fruitless walks in search for her, here he stood, in her garden on a pitch-black night, suddenly flooded by a new bout of doubts. He made his way across the lawn resolutely, trying to make as much noise as reasonably possible –to scare her was the last thing he wanted.

If she had heard him, she gave no sign of it. _Perhaps she's hoping I'll leave if she ignores me_, he thought. _Perhaps I should._ He stepped up to her.

"Regina," he cleared his throat awkwardly.

She didn't speak; she didn't move an inch. She did absolutely nothing to acknowledge his presence.

"May I sit down? Or…if you'd prefer to be alone…?"

She looked up at him reluctantly at last, half her face hidden in shadow – all the harder to read her expression. _Let me talk to you_, he pleaded wordlessly, _as unsure as I might be about what to say or how. _Quietly, she turned back away from him. His heart dropped, and he was almost ready to leave when she finally spoke, still facing away from him.

"It's alright, you can sit."

Relief must have shown on his face but he knew she didn't see. He took a seat next to her gingerly, not too close but not too far, he hoped. _How do you determine the right distance anyway?_ Once again, she paid him no attention whatsoever, looking straight ahead with a vacant expression. _Well, I guess it could have been worse; at least she didn't send me straight to hell._ Unsure how to begin, or whether to begin at all, Archie turned his eyes to stare in the same direction.

"I'm glad to see you're well." Her voice came unexpected after a long silence; her words even more so. Perhaps it wasn't too late then. He searched her still averted face – to no avail - before he answered.

"Yes. My supposed death. I've heard of the accusations made against you. I'm sorry you'd had to go through that."

"Well, it's not your fault." Her voice was surprisingly calm and level, yet still she wouldn't look at him. _What's really happening inside? _A thousandth time he asked himself this question.

"Even so. You'd been trying so hard, doing so well…to have it all blow up in your face for no misstep of your own, is most…regrettable." That was an understatement, he knew, but he didn't want to make things worse by reminding her just what a nightmare it must have been. Despite his caution, he had blundered, and he was made to see that soon enough.

Regina turned to him sharply and looked him full in the face. A streetlamp from outside threw a faint light on her enraged features, and her fierce glare pierced right through his soul.

"I lost Henry because of it - again. I assure you, it was much more than regrettable," she retorted sharply. Yet it wasn't the sharpness of her outburst that shook him as much as the shadow of pain in her eyes. Before he could think of an answer, her features softened somewhat, and she bowed her head a little; the pained expression remained, however. "I guess the fact that I'd been the last one you'd been seen with, and that our conversation hadn't been of the friendliest sort, might have spoken against me," she added bitterly.

Archie shuffled uncomfortably. _This is precisely what we need to discuss_, he braced himself.

"About that…I've been meaning to talk to you…to apologise. My intentions might have been the best, but that still didn't give me the right to divulge the information I did. I should have realised how it'd make you feel…that it would make you feel betrayed." _There_, he thought. _It's out. About time, too._

Regina raised her head again, tilting it slightly. She looked at him long and hard, her face an unreadable mask. As he opened his mouth to speak again without knowing what he was about to say, he saw the mask crack before his very eyes. At that moment his worst fear was confirmed; he had hit the nail on the head. She swallowed unwittingly. _Yes_, her eyes accused, just the same as they had back then, at the pier, the last time they'd met, _betray me you did_. Her lips, however, spoke a different accusation yet, one full of contempt and reproach.

"And you've waited all this time to make that apology?"

"I should have come earlier. I just wasn't sure how I'd be received." It was true. He had been shocked to learn of the injustice done to her when he'd been thought dead and murdered. Still busy with the effort to recover from his time in captivity, he had spent many an hour wondering where she was, what she was doing, how she was holding up against the whole town, her mother, and most of all, herself. He had spent many an hour considering his options, yes; perhaps too many an hour, he knew.

"Were you afraid of the Evil Queen's wrath? Was that what held you back?" she snarled mockingly, mercilessly.

"I guess I deserve that…" he sighed with a sad nod after a moment's silence. He weighed his words carefully. "It's true; I didn't know where we stood, and I felt I needed to work out how I could approach you in a way that wouldn't be seen as, let's say, threatening. So ,yes. I was anxious about it. I shouldn't have waited so long."

She lashed back immediately, her words raw with emotion, her look intense as ever.

"I was unhappy when I thought you dead, and not just because I was wrongly accused of murdering you. Perhaps it would have been decent to at least show up after you returned, don't you think?" Realising suddenly that she had given away more than she'd intended to, she dropped her eyes. Unable to stop the flow of the words now the dam had broken, she went on with her voice breaking, torn between the unwillingness to expose herself and the irrepressible urge to give voice to her frustration. "With all that went down since, I could have used a f-…someone to talk to," she finished after a nonplussed pause. "So when my mother came…"

At that point, her voice seemed to have failed her. He could have sworn her cheeks had hollowed and her eyes darkened in mere seconds in her colour-drained face. In moments, she had turned into a ghost.

"Regina…" He spoke, aghast at the sudden metamorphosis. He moved closer instinctively and reached to touch her arm with gentle urgency. She flinched at his touch, and backed away, hardly aware of what she was doing. Slowly, carefully, he leaned over to catch a look at her face. There was emptiness in her down-cast eyes, a sense of loss so deep and grave it scared him.

"My mother is dead." It was barely more than a whisper; her lip quivered as she uttered it. Her eyes glistened in the dark, soft and vulnerable. Her hands flew to her face to hide the intense storm of emotions.

"I know," he said softly. Unsure, Archie raised his hand again, desperate to offer some kind of consolation. She stroked her hair lightly, hardly touching it. Regina whimpered. _No_, he pleaded wretchedly, _please don't…_ He gathered her into his arms with the same gentle urgency he had approached her with before. She shied away at first, but gave way when he stroked her hair again, and buried her face in his jacket. He held her as she sobbed into his shoulder.

"I'm sorry…so very sorry…about your loss," he muttered close to her ear. Regina gave one last dry sob and disentangled herself from his arms to look up into his face, her own glistening with tears. She gave him a long searching look.

"You truly are," she said, a hint of wonder and disbelief in her voice. He nodded earnestly.

"I am. Truly."

Not ungently, or so Archie liked to believe, Regina pushed his arms away. She wiped the tears off her face in a resolute motion and resumed staring straight ahead with her jaw set.

Archie sensed a further show of affection would only cause her discomfort and, potentially, deepen the pain, so he just sat there, watching her from the corner of his eye. The silence was complete; not a cricket chirped in the night.

Again, it was Regina who first broke the silence; apparently, she was following a trail of thought that didn't take her far from the memory of her mother.

"Were you treated badly?"

"I…was mostly confined to Hook's company. Cora only appeared once or twice to see how the interrogation was coming along, check whether her…input was required."

It was a lame attempt to disguise the actual meaning behind this, he knew; she understood as well as himself what the words 'interrogation' and 'input' concealed. Perhaps she also understood the consideration behind his failed attempt she didn't comment.

"I'm sorry about…all of that," she spoke with a quick glance at him.

"Not your fault, Regina."

"I know. Yet I feel bad about it all the same. She did it to get to me after all."

"I tried my best. To reveal as little as possible, I mean. It was-"

"It' alright, Archie, let's not talk about it anymore."

"As you wish. Best focus on what's ahead. I'm sure things will improve now that Henry knows you're innocent, and it's not too late to-"

"Thank you," she interrupted. There was no mistaking it – she'd spoken to stop him from finishing that sentence. "I'm afraid things aren't quite so simple, but I'll manage."

Archie was about to say more; Regina rose resolutely.

"It's late," she announced. "I shall go now."

_The audience is at an end_, he thought involuntarily, then gave himself a mental shake. _This is Regina_, he reminded himself with a frown. _Not the Queen. Regina. _He stood as well. Their eyes locked for a moment. She looked away quickly and made to leave.

"Regina," he called out. She turned. "Are we alright?"

She stood in silence, her face in the shadow. Anxiously, Archie pressed on.

"I'd be glad to talk to you once in a while; even if you don't want to see me as doctor - patient anymore…but as friends, perhaps?"

The question remained hanging in the air unanswered for a good while. _Is this too much to ask? Perhaps she needs more time._

"We are alright."

It was only the nod he could make out in the dark and the tone of her voice that he could judge by, and he hoped the sincerity he believed to have caught was not just wishful thinking. He let out a long, relieved breath.

Regina turned on her heel and set off briskly. Just before she was swallowed up by the darkness, she turned her head in his direction, never slowing her pace, and called back to him quietly.

"Thank you."

4


End file.
